Hugo Semrád: It is completely fine to make mistakes

Mgr. Hugo Semrád, Ph.D. 

He studied Physical Chemistry at the Faculty of Science. Today, he works at the Department of Chemistry as a lecturer, student advisor, student success advisor, and coordinator of SOČ. 

In addition to his doctoral studies, he has completed a number of accredited courses, such as an introduction to crisis intervention, basics of working with traumatized clients, or working with aggression, frustration, and anger. He also completed a basic psychological first aid course and is currently finishing a coaching training programme. 

Previously, he also worked at the Faculty of Pharmacy in Hradec Králové and at RECETOX, where he focused on the processing and analysis of spectrometric data. 

 

The courses you teach are often considered among the more demanding ones – whether because they are highly abstract or involve a lot of mathematics. What do you do to reduce students’ anxiety about these subjects? 

I start from the assumption that every student comes from a different secondary school background and they are not all at the same level. Some are stronger in mathematics, while others are simply a bit less confident. Since these courses are taught very early in the degree programme, typically in the second or third semester, I try to level out those differences at the beginning. I want the bar to be set high enough that stronger students are not bored, while ensuring that those who are struggling do not give up entirely. 

My main tool is creating a safe learning environment. I repeatedly tell students that it is completely okay to make mistakes or to tell me honestly that they don't know right now and need this explained differently. When that happens, I use guiding questions to figure out how I can help them move forward. Over time, the stress associated with the course starts to fade. 

You can see this very clearly in their fear of solving problems at the board. At the beginning of the semester, everyone is nervous about it, but once they are up there, they realize it was actually no big deal. I have recently come up with an idea to improve this even further – students will not go to the board alone, but in pairs as mutual support. 

 

How did you come up with that idea? 

Perhaps because I am naturally people-oriented, which is not always the norm in the natural sciences. I am not saying this applies to everyone, but some colleagues are simply hard scientists, and the „soft” side of teaching is not necessarily their primary focus. 

Professional development has also helped me enormously in this regard. I am currently completing a coaching training programme, and I find it so inspiring that I am even considering undertaking a full psychotherapy training programme in the future. 

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„Crisis intervention training is a fantastic tool for helping students regain stability when they find themselves in emotionally challenging situations.” 

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Could you tell us more about how you develop yourself as a teacher? What other training have you completed, and what has it brought you? 

Certainly. Following on from my previous answer, these kinds of courses are incredibly valuable when the point is working with groups. They help me precisely with creating a safe environment. For example, I completed an introductory, sixteen-hour crisis intervention training course, and I am considering pursuing comprehensive training in the future. One has to balance the investment of time and money, but crisis intervention is a fantastic tool for helping students regain stability when they find themselves in emotionally challenging situations. 

Furthermore, there were various courses focused on working with aggression, anger, and frustration, or very interesting work with trauma. Many of us carry emotional wounds of some kind – and I do not mean that in any dismissive or degrading way, it is simply a reality of life. Sometimes these issues surface during teaching and trigger a defensive response. A student who normally understands the material may come to the board, notice everyone watching, and suddenly go completely blank because they subconsciously feel threatened. In such moments, I try to show that person that it is okay to feel the way they do, and together we look for ways to overcome those barriers. 

 

How can you tell when students are genuinely learning in your classes? 

That is a difficult question. You cannot simply say that an active student automatically understands the material. I often encounter students at the opposite pole – they rarely speak in seminars, but then achieve perfect scores on tests. On the other hand, a highly active student demonstrates tremendous motivation and willingness to learn, but may occasionally lack some fundamental knowledge. 

So how do I know? Perhaps this sounds old-fashioned, but the first indicator is, of course, test results. However, those results are heavily influenced by a student's current psychological state. A test comes along, stress appears, and a person experiences a mental blackout. Students tell me this themselves during consultations: „I understand the material, but the moment I see the title Test from Physical Chemistry on the paper, my mind goes blank.” In those cases, we focus more on individual support aimed at overcoming these psychological barriers. 

 

You also mentioned your role as a student advisor for the dropout prevention. What does that role involve? 

To be honest, I came to the role somewhat by accident. The agenda already existed at our faculty, but when I was a student myself, hardly anyone knew about it. I still encounter that situation today, even though I have been doing this for four years – I started in the summer of 2022, shortly after joining the faculty. At the time, I was surprised that such a position even existed, but I think I have helped raise awareness of it considerably since then. 

The work itself involves identifying students through the Information System who are genuinely at risk of being excluded from their studies. For example, they may lack sufficient credits to progress, be repeating a course, or have accumulated a series of failing grades in the system. Monitoring students’ progress throughout the semester is crucial. It is particularly helpful when teachers record an „X” grade for inactivity, which is assigned around one-third of the way through the semester. For some students, that warning serves as a wake-up call and motivates them to engage more actively. If I see several such „X” grades or missing marks, I contact the student immediately. Of course, it sometimes turns out that a student is simply no longer interested in studying and sees the programme merely as a stepping stone to something else, but with many others we are able to catch the problem early enough. 

 

The measures you describe are a reaction once a student has already received grades such as F or X. Can you estimate how often the situation can still be turned around at that stage, and how often the student is already mentally elsewhere and no longer views their studies as a priority? 

I could not give precise figures off the top of my head because, as a student success advisor, I do not have access to tools that allow me to monitor students’ ongoing work in every course. I cannot see their partial scores in gradebooks, for example, only the final decisions made by instructors. That is precisely why the „X” grade is so fantastic – it is the first visible warning sign for me far enough in advance when I can still realistically intervene. Until it appears in the system, I have no way of knowing that a student – typically in their first semester – is struggling. That is, unless they approach me directly or a teacher lets me know. 

Once I see that warning sign and reach out to the student, success depends primarily on them. I have a template email ready offering a consultation, but I must fully respect the freedom of their decision. I never pressure anyone into anything. A portion of the students catch on, come to address the situation, and we save their studies. The second portion, however, is already mentally truly elsewhere, does not respond to the message at all, and simply leaves the university. 

 

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„My dream is a kind, human-centred campaign that would show students there is no shame in asking for help.” 

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If you could design a system or set of tools from your position as a student success advisor that would make your role easier, or help catch situations earlier before you see them in the instructor's final decision, what would it look like? Do you have any ideas or dreams in this area? 

I have been thinking about this for years. What would help me, as well as other student success advisors and academic counsellors, most would be massive awareness campaigns. Information that there are people at the faculties who are there directly for students. Of course, we have the Student Advisory Centre or Teiresias, but waiting times can be long. In addition, students are often afraid, or conversely convince themselves until the very last moment that they can handle everything on their own. They are still young adults, and that transition to full responsibility is an overwhelming burden. Catching reality in time is often difficult. 

My dream is therefore a kind, human-centred campaign that would show students there is no shame in asking for help. Ideally in the form of stickers on the inside of restroom doors. At our department, we try to do this, our director devotes a few minutes of the introductory lecture for first-year students to counseling and prevention. But that is not enough. When I put myself in the shoes of a student who has just arrived in a big city, detached from family and support network, I see someone under extreme stress. They are totally overwhelmed. In that first week, they receive so much information that barely single-digit percentages of it reach long-term memory. A better approach would be the continuous and non-intrusive repetition of this information throughout the semester. 

 

Let us return to your teaching. Could you describe the seminar structure that has worked best for you? 

All of my courses revolve around physical chemistry, and the seminars are primarily calculation-based. It has proven effective that students have materials created by me available in advance in two versions. In the first version, they find problem sets and right in square brackets also the answers. The stronger and faster ones can thus calculate during class at their own pace and immediately verify whether they have arrived at the correct number. 

The problem sets are divided into two parts – examples that we solve together during the seminar, and exercises for voluntary practice. I do not want any compulsory homework from students, I know they have more than enough on their plate. In the past, homework served as a good basis for discussion, but in recent years I have noticed that debates in classes are declining. Students make heavy use of AI during their home preparation. I do not necessarily see that as a bad thing if they consult the procedure with it in order to reach the result. However, I cannot yet judge one hundred percent how effective it is for their own learning. 

I often encounter students wanting practice problems straight away with complete model solutions. However, I deliberately do not do that in seminars. I first need to see independent activity and effort from them to figure it out. Therefore, I make complete model solutions accessible to them only at the end of the week. They are detailed, color-coded, with all units, and additionally contain a concise summary of theory and an interpretation of the results. 

 

Can you recall something new you tried in teaching that did not work as expected? 

I have fresh experience from last year. I do not want to say it was a complete failure, because many students appreciated the idea according to their feedback, but the outcome surprised us. We tried introducing intensive continuous testing. We wrote a test almost every week, which forced students to prepare continuously. However, what backfired was that we allowed them to use cheat sheets during these tests – which they naturally could not have at the exam or state exams. 

Essentially, we were preparing them in seminars for completely different conditions than those awaiting them at the final assessment. The first regular exam term then turned out below average compared to previous years, because students were accustomed to cheat sheets and suddenly did not have them. My colleagues and I had to quickly do statistics back then and hastily adjust both the grading and the parameters of further exam terms. It was a clear lesson for me. I no longer want to go down this path in seminars, and today I require students to actually remember the truly important things in their heads.